tryna stay healthy and move away from processed meats, whilst also spending as little time prepping food as possible.
Cheezwhiz on white bread
Eggs and spinach and hot sauce is fantastic. No prep, just toss them on top of each other.
guess that’s what im doing already but without bread or bacon. should be easy. thanks
Half a pound of tofu with some sesame oil, honey, soy sauce, and sriracha.
A handful of frozen “stir fry Veggies”
Toss it in the air fryer for like 15 minutes at 360-ish.
Sometimes I serve it with microwave steamed brown rice from costco.
It’s like $3 of ingredients at the most and its super healthy.
If you have a diet high in seed oils, consider a different aromatic oil or skip the oil altogether.
Where are you getting a half pound of tofu alone for under 3$?
Also, its personal preference but damn if siracha isn’t over and just tastes badic and boring. Surely there is a better sauce substitute here.
I buy 4 pounds at a time from Costco and cut the bricks in half.
There is a little part of course but I end up cooking with days meals at once
Is the issue time spent prepping food, or being bored while you’re prepping food? I prep my lunches on Sunday night. Sunday night, I sit in front of the tv, with one of those folding tray tables in front of me, and I make 10 salads, one for lunch and one for dinner for the next five days. I’m very heavy on the veggies and moderately light on the lettuce, so they’re pretty filling.
I vary things among the salads so it doesn’t get boring: I’ll toss bits of apple or some raisins, off maybe split one of those single-serve fruit cups among a few; toss different cheeses or hard-boiled eggs or bits of meat in others, etc. The veggies and stuff go in the bottom, lettuce on top so it doesn’t get crushed during the week. Salad dressing goes in an old pill bottle on the side. Anything I was too keep crunchy - croutons, tortilla bits, etc - goes in a Ziploc on the side. Takes me less than half an hour to make 10 salads.
If there’s leftover veggies, I’ll make snack bags: veggies in a Ziploc, sometimes plain, sometimes with a pill or other bottle of dip-able flavoring: dressing or dip or peanut butter.
You could do the same kind of in-front-of-tv prep for homemade soup mixes (add hot water and let sit) or overnight oats (do the dry ingredients into your eating container, cut up any fruit into a separate bowl, then add the fruit and dairy the night before), etc.
if you have access to an Indian market, get paneer (firm cheese). you can slice it thin, add oil and seasonings like smokey paprika salt pepper. then either fry it in a pan or air fryer. it gets crispy and delicious. I used to make PLTs (paneer, lettuce, tomato) sandwiches.
ill look into that thanks. never heard of it
Just get some vegan bacon, at least where I live there are several options by now and they’re all pretty good.
If you want it a bit healthier but maybe a bit less tasty as well, try smoked tofu and cut it into thin slices.
oooooh veggie bacon interesting! ill look for it
What about the options:
- Egg salad sandwich?
- Chicken salad sandwich?
- Chicken breast and rice with peas?
- Farmers sausage and purified?
- Steak and potatoes?
- Chicken noodle soup?
- Beef stew?
I try to make a supper that can provide me with enough leftovers to make lunches with. I freeze lunch portions and consume them in a variety pattern so I don’t get bored with them.
Buy a pork belly. Make your own bacon. It’s pretty easy and very delicious. That said, nitrates are in lots of things like celery.
Can you describe the process in general, or point to a good recipe?
How to make bacon: https://youtu.be/8fuOmhzGAtg
Mix salt, cure and sugar by weight based on weight of belly to be cured. Coat both sides with cure and place on a rack in the fridge. Turn daily and remove any fluid that drips on the tray under the rack. Leave for 5-7days. Remove from fridge. Rinse with cold water to remove the cure. Dry and place back on the rack in the fridge overnight. The next day smoke to your liking. You can cold or hot smoke it.
Slice and yummm bacon…
Is “cure” an ingredient?
Sorry it’s called “Prague powder”. A pink substance that looks kind of like salt. Yes it’s an ingredient. It’s the ingredient that replaces some salt as the curing agent. Basically nitrates. Instead of salted meat you get cured meat. It’s also used in most processed meats like Salamis and Coppa and such and gives “that flavor” to sured meats.
Wait what? Nitrates in celery?
You can find lots of packaging for ‘nitrate free’ things that have a disclaimer somewhere saying ‘*except from celery.’
Yeah, that’s how food processors cure meat without using curing salts: they just replace it with celery juice or celery powder that contains natural nitrates, which cause the same effect but allow for different labeling rules.
Most often we will eat either:
- One or two slice of fresh (whole or even black) bread. Not the industrial type of bread, real handmade bread (we get it from the artisan bakery down our street). Toasted or not, with a tad of jam, and a cup of tea. Some fruit, depending the season. It takes mere instants to prepare.
- An egg. Boiled, omelette, scrambled, whatever. With my omelette, I like to add some fresh tomato, mushrooms and a tad of parsley. No bacon or things like that. This too takes mere instants to cook. Followed by a tea or a coffee.
- A croissant (it helps to live in France, as we get ours handmade from the same small bakery at the corner of our street we get our baguettes and bread from ;)) and a coffee.
For lunch and/or diner both my spouse and I like to prepare a few meals in advance (mostly vegetables even though we’re not vegan, we just want to eat less meat), using fresh non-industrially processed condiments. To save time, we will make 2 or even 3 meals worth in advance and store it in the fridge.
Egg and turkey bacon sandwich.
Assuming the rest of your diet isn’t stuffed with red meat I wouldn’t worry too much about eating bacon. Replacing meat with vegan meat-substitutes doesn’t automatically make the meal healthier - just free of meat.
Til nitrates free can have just as much nitrates https://www.americastestkitchen.com/articles/1701-nitrate-versus-nitrite-what-s-the-difference
I’ll happily send you links to two googly drives of cookery books, if you’d like
Today it was felafel Greek salad and Greek potatos. Gotta mix it up…
Easiest solution is to use unprocessed meats. Get thin sliced pork, (butchers usually have a deli slicer for raw meat, or you can do it yourself with a knife if you are careful) add a dab of honey or maple and a sprinkle of cayenne and cook.
My advice, don’t “substitute”, instead replace.
There are so many delicious healthy options, and all the fake meat substitutes are garbage in comparison.
Eggs are great sources of protein already, so put just about anything on instead. BBC Good Foods is a great resource for easy meals and sandwiches with healthier ingredients if you need ideas.
I’ve also recently cut way back on processed meats, and honestly have really been enjoying pan fried tofu, chickpeas (seasoned and air fried are amazing), and many other protein sources enough that I’ve cut a lot of meat out by default.
